


Sun-kissed Hurricane, Perfect Storm

by iwillpaintasongforlou



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: (sort of), Americanized I guess, High School AU, M/M, Punk!Louis, adhd!Louis, lots of Harry fawning over Louis, nerdy!Harry, not Marcel but Marcel-adjacent, slacker!louis, writer!harry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-22
Updated: 2014-02-22
Packaged: 2018-01-13 08:59:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1220350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iwillpaintasongforlou/pseuds/iwillpaintasongforlou
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry is the quiet kid in the back of his statistics class who writes a lot and dreams about Louis’ cheekbones . Louis needs a statistics tutor ASAP before he flunks and the quiet kid in the back of the class seems like a good choice. Harry wants to help Louis however he can and Louis wants to see how much he can make Harry blush.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sun-kissed Hurricane, Perfect Storm

**Author's Note:**

> Dedicated to tumblr user ciaoloueh for prompting the conversation that gave birth to this idea! Love you, girl :)

Harry has always disliked it when people use the word ‘quiet’ to describe others. They always mean it in the sense that they don’t talk a lot, but that isn’t the end of the definition, is it? When you say that a person is quiet, it’s more like saying that everything they do and say is quiet, is on some softer, less noticeable plane that needs to be noted as different.

Of course, Harry probably only disliked being called quiet because that’s exactly what he was.

There are some people who slip under the radar in every situation, like there’s something that makes it impossible for you to think about them for too long- and in this school, that was Harry. There were people who had been in classes with him since primary school who probably wouldn’t recognize him on the street. Even the teachers didn’t pay him any attention, despite the fact that he was one of the best students they’d ever had.

It wasn’t that people didn’t _like_ him, it’s just that with all of the stuff going on in life, who had the time or energy to focus on little old Harry? He was just so… _quiet._

He opened the pages of his journal and made a note on the first blank page. _Theme: people who can be summed up in one word. Ex: quiet._ Unlikely that he’d ever get around to writing about that, since his pages were filled up with hundreds of other ideas just like that one, but he liked writing it down just the same. This journal was full of everything that went through Harry’s head, from to-do lists and dreams he remembered in the morning to poems and songs and pieces of prose. It was always with him, wherever he went-

The silence and stillness of the library where Harry was having lunch was suddenly shattered in a burst of laughter, a rumble of feet, and the sound of a door smacking a wall as it swung open. Harry was smiling before he even looked up- not that he needed to look up. If he was synonymous with the word ‘quiet,’ then the boy who’d just stormed in with his posse and his eyeliner and his myriad of facial piercings was how you defined ‘loud.’

It could only be Louis Tomlinson.                    

He was like the day to Harry’s night. Harry was the center of nothing; Louis was the center of _everything._ People remembered Louis from that one time he said ‘hey’ to them in a hallway two years ago. He never entered a room without making an entrance. He never left without taking most of the energy in the space with him. He was just so… _loud._

He was flanked by two boys that were on the football team with him, one of whom found himself being pushed playfully into a bookcase by the sun-kissed hurricane himself. They pretended to be chastised by the librarian, dropped off whatever they’d come with, and left once more in a flurry of snickers and laughter. Harry made another note in his journal.

_Poem idea: the way the air refuses to settle down even after he’s gone._

This one might actually get written. The ones about Louis usually do, which is fine. That journal is everything that crosses Harry’s mind, and after all, it’s Louis who’s on most of the pages.

......................

Louis knows he’s in trouble -for real trouble, not ‘trouble’- when his mom says she wants to talk after the girls are already in bed. The post-bedtime lull is the only peace she gets, so if she’s spending it to talk to him now instead of just calling it to him over the chaos at dinner… she probably means business.

“I got a call from the school today,” she starts off, which is not an unusual phrase to hear her say. Schools have been calling home about Louis Tomlinson since before he knew what the phone was.

“Oh?” was his noncommittal reply.

“It was the guidance counselor. She said you’re about to flunk out of statistics.”

That got a wince. He’d been expecting this one for a while, actually. In general _all_ of his grades were cringeworthy, but statistics in general was awful. He never really bothered to check what his grades were, but he was fairly certain this last exam had put him a fraction of a point away from an F.

“Yeah, that one’s not my best,” Louis carefully says. “Don’t have the patience for math, never have. You know that.”

“I do know that. But I also know you’d better get serious about pulling that grade up, because if you fail this course, you have to go to summer school.” Mom sounds too tired to be stern as she settles into her recliner with a cup of coffee, but she tries. “Your schedule’s full next year, so if you want to graduate, you need to be passing every course.”

“Well I definitely want to graduate,” is all Louis can think to say. He’s got this annoying feeling in his stomach- what is that, guilt or something? But it’s only because Mom shouldn’t be worrying about him when she had more important things to deal with. Like four daughters and a full time job.

She isn’t unkind about it though. “I know you do. I want you to graduate on time, too. But I don’t think you want to have to go to summer school in order to get there.”

“Not really, no.”

“Then you have to make it a priority to pull that grade up,” Mom simply replies. “Form a study group or something, maybe that would help.”

Louis almost laughs out loud- like he could focus in a room full of people. That was sort of the problem, wasn’t it? Too much going on in a classroom for him to look at a whiteboard or take notes. If he tried to join a study group, he’d wind up getting everyone off track and then they’d _all_ fail.

His mother must have been thinking along the same lines, because she cocked her head and frowned a little. “Well. Maybe not a group. What about something one-on-one, like a tutor? Anyone you know that might be able to help you out?”

“I don’t know, Mom,” Louis sighed. “It’s not like any of my friends are any better at it than I am.”

“Then you find the smartest kid in the class and you have them help you out.” And that was the end of that discussion.

The problem was that Louis had no idea who the smartest kid was. That would require, like, paying attention to what went on in class- which certainly wasn’t something Louis made a habit of doing. He spent an entire three minutes- record-breaking for him- thinking about it before deciding that he’d just have to try to remember to look for someone tomorrow in class. Someone smart. Someone to save his ass.

That someone, as it turned out, was a curly-haired kid in the back of the class. Louis had made it a point to survey the room during his last-period statistics lecture. It would have to be someone quiet, probably, because it was always the quiet ones who did the best, wasn’t it?

He knew it would have to be this one because he almost didn’t look at him at all. He was closer to invisible than Louis thought any person could be, tucked away in the corner writing in some little leather book. They were only twenty minutes into class and his assignment sheet was already finished on the edge of his desk, which just solidified it. He was the one.

So Louis lingered after the bell, watching the students drain from the room and waiting for Harry to come back to reality. Whatever he was writing must have been pretty interesting, because he was still sitting at his desk five minutes after everyone else was gone. Even the teacher had wandered off, but Harry’s pen was still scratching quietly away.

It took about two minutes of silence before Louis couldn’t be still anymore. He slid off his perch atop the desk with the practiced grace of someone who rarely stopped moving, but even the quiet pad of his feet hitting the linoleum was enough to jerk the kid’s attention from the book and right to him.

Louis watched as the kid flushed bright red, though no words came out of the open mouth. He cleared his throat and did the awkward honors of speaking first, since apparently this kid wasn’t capable of speech at the moment. “Um, sorry. Didn’t mean to, erm, bother you.”

“It’s- that’s perfectly fine,” the other managed to reply. “You don’t bother me. I mean you didn’t- well I mean you _don’t,_ like in general, but specifically right then, also you didn’t. Bother me. Um.”

“Right, gotcha.” Louis didn’t get a word of that. “Anyways, hi. I’m Louis Tomlinson. Not sure we’ve met before.” He strode over and offered a hand for him to shake, which seemed too formal and a little weird, but then, this kid seemed a little weird. So.

“Yeah, I know who you are. I mean. Uh- Harry. Harry Styles.” The hand that shook Louis’ was a little shaky and surprisingly large. He was kind of lanky for someone who seemed to take up so little space.

“Right. Harry. Um, listen, can I ask you for a favor? Kind of a big one.”

Harry’s eyes, which were very green and rather nice, opened up wide. “Sure, anything. I mean- sure.”

“You’re good at statistics, aren’t you? I noticed that you, like, finished your work really quick,” Louis said probingly. A hesitant nod answered him. “Well, the thing is, I’m- well, I’m not. I’m about to fail if I don’t get my act together, and if I fail then I have to go to summer school, which is fucking lame. And the guidance counselor told my Mom that, and she told me to find a tutor, so I had to like pay attention and decide who might be a good tutor in our class. And I saw that you were good so I was thinking that maybe if it was okay then you could tutor me in stat? I’m babbling.”

“Yeah.” Harry sounded as out-of-breath as Louis felt.

“Er. Yeah I’m babbling or yeah you’ll tutor me?”

“Sorry-both,” clarified Harry with a flush. “Do you just need me to help you study for the exam on Friday, or like, long-term?”

Louis’ life flashed briefly before his eyes. “There’s an exam on Friday?”

Harry stopped chewing on his lip for the first time since Louis came over in order to smile lopsidedly. “Okay, so I guess you need a little help right away.”

“A lot, actually. Like. Could you maybe teach me the entire first half of the course? Because that would be fantastic.”

“S-so long term, then?” Harry was back to nervous, his thumb making unconscious swipes at the leather cover of his little journal like he was trying to wipe away a smudge that wasn’t there.

“Probably, yeah, if you could,” confessed Louis. “Can I give you my number, and we could like, figure out when? But this week would really, _really_ be good because if I fail that exam Friday I’m completely blown.”

“You won’t,” Harry says firmly, and he’s got a look of determination under that flushed, dimpled exterior. “We could start tomorrow, if you want- maybe during lunch? I’m usually in the library, so you could join me...”

“Yeah, alright,” Louis said easily. “You still want my number, just in case?”

So Harry opened his book to a fresh page and carefully copied down the number Louis told him, right in the dead center of the page. Weird. But Louis didn’t say anything about that, he just smiled and said his farewell, making his way out to the parking lot to catch his ride feeling more relieved than he’d expected to.

Yes, if anyone was going to save his ass, it was that kid. He was the one.

………………….

It took Harry a full fifteen minutes to return to equilibrium after Louis walked away. Maybe he had altered the chemistry of the air or something, because there was _definitely_ a different feel to breathing in a room that had Louis in it and one that didn’t. It wasn’t his imagination, it was Louis’ own brand of alchemy.

Okay, so that was definitely a line for the poem.

He was still reeling. Not just from the extended conversation- it really wasn’t his thing, talking back and forth in more than five syllables at a time- but because it had been an extended conversation with _Louis Tomlinson._ The boy he literally had a stack of sonnets about had honestly come up to him and asked if Harry would be his statistics tutor.

Was this some sort of fever dream, or what? Because the boy you’ve been crushing on since elementary school suddenly noticing you is _not_ the kind of thing that happens to quiet boys like Harry.

And yet, no matter how many times he peeked into his journal on the walk home, the number scrawled there did not disappear. He pretty much had it memorized by now, if he was honest with himself, which was alright. Now the only thing that would prevent him from texting his dream guy was some sort of traumatic brain injury, and Harry quite logically figured that he probably wouldn’t be Louis’ tutor anyways after that. So.

At least he had the self-control to wait until that night to text, and it was only a casual, _Hey this is Harry Styles… this is my number._ Which he regretted right after he sent, of course, because no duh that was his number. “You can’t even keep it together with him over text,” Harry mumbled to himself. “Good luck being intelligent and attractive in his actual presence.”

Not that Harry had any kind of a chance with him. Louis was gay, everyone knew that, but just because Harry had the right parts didn’t mean he was the kind of guy Louis was going to go for. Princes don’t fall for peasants in real life, unfortunately. Harry knew enough about fairy tales to know that.

Even still, he may have worn his very best sweater the next day, the one that made his eyes look extra green even behind the thick lenses of his glasses. And he might have gotten Gemma to do his eyebrows or something. Maybe.

Louis was just as casually flawless as usual when he breezed into the library the next day at lunch, though. The lights got brighter, Harry was pretty sure of it. He hadn’t even finished scribbling that down in his journal before Louis had bounded over and plopped down across the table with an ever-present smirk.

“Hello, Harry,” he said easily, maybe a little too loud for the library. Harry didn’t correct him.

“Hey Louis,” he pushed out in reply. Just like he practiced. Super casual. _You can do this, Harry._

“So… I don’t mean to be all business, but where do we start?” Louis asked, already fidgeting. He had one of Harry’s pencils in his hand and was spinning it with his fingertips for a good thirty seconds before Harry remembered he was supposed to respond.

“Oh. Uhh, I guess we can just go through the book until we get to a part where you don’t understand and start there,” he suggested meekly.

Louis grinned. “Yeah, alright, sounds like a plan.”

Harry waited for him to pull out a textbook, but realized a second later that he hadn’t brought anything into the library with him, not even a backpack. “Did you not- do you have a book?”

“Uhm, maybe? At home, I think.” Louis grimaced. “Guess I should have brought that, eh? Sorry, I’m so shit at this. Plans aren’t really my thing, and studying’s pretty new, too.”

“It’s okay,” Harry jumped to assure him. “We can just share mine, I guess. Um- can you see?”

Louis cocked his head to look at the page before rising and walking around the table to drop into the seat on Harry’s right. “There we go,” he said as he straightened the book before them. “Let’s see. I think I’ve got this, and this…”

He flicked through the pages of the textbook while Harry focused his attention on the arduous task of continuing to breathe. You see, Louis Tomlinson was about six inches away from him, chin propped on one strong, veiny hand while the other thumbed through Harry’s textbook, and that was kind of a stressful thing. Harry was trying very hard not to do weird things like study the shape of his ear or anything. He was gonna be fine. He was gonna breathe, and he was gonna be fine.

(Louis smelled kind of like spray paint and grass. Harry burned that into his mind so he wouldn’t forget to write it down later.)

“So can we start here?” Louis was asking as Harry returned to Earth. “On chapter four?”

“Of course,” Harry agreed, like he had the power to argue. “That’s um… that’s good, you’re not really that far behind. We’re only on chapter seven.”

“I’m exceptionally stupid, so three chapters is plenty to worry about.”

“You’re not stupid,” Harry defended at once. “If you know all of the stuff from the first three chapters you should have done okay on the first two tests, so you probably just aren’t a good test-taker, that’s all.”

Louis snorted. “How’d you know I bombed the tests?”

“You said you were failing, right? I just figured.” _Not that I happen to pay attention to you every time you speak and heard you talking to someone in class about it. Not that I find all of your words important or anything weird like that._

“Oh. Well, I guess. I just get bored easily. And if something’s not important to me, it’s hard for me to waste time on it, you know?”

It’s the most honest and intimate thing that Harry’s ever heard Louis say to anyone, about anything, and he tucks it way back into the corner of his mind reserved for beautiful things.

“Well you’re here, so it must be at least a little important,” is all he says out loud.

And it must be, because Louis does at least _try._ He sits in the chair next to Harry for almost the entire lunch period, and does the problems he’s told. Of course, he also spends a good deal of time dissecting erasers and folding worksheets into paper cranes, and by the end of it he’s ignoring Harry’s instructions and instead is turned around backwards in his chair and trying to smoothly divert attention away from the task at hand to literally _anything_ else.

“Do you drive?” he asked Harry when a word problem about the standard deviation of car sales comes up. “You’re sixteen, right? Yeah, do you drive?”

Harry admits defeat at last, sighing good-naturedly as he closes the book. “So I think that’s all we’ll try to do today.”

“Perfect,” Louis beams. “Wish you would have agreed with me on that twenty minutes ago, but.”

His pout is pretty convincing. “I didn’t push you too hard, did I?” Harry asked with concern.

“A little,” sighs Louis dramatically. “I just feel like you’re not respecting my limitations. You know?”

Harry’s heart is a rock sinking to the bottom of the Marianas trench. “I’m sorry, I thought- I mean, you said that you just get distracted so I thought I was supposed to push to keep you on task, but I- I never meant to upset you or anything-”

“Relax, god, I’m just teasing you, kid,” Louis said with a laugh. “Cute that you got all concerned though,” he adds kindly, reaching out to ruffle Harry’s hair.

It’s literally all that Harry can do not to light up like a Christmas tree at the touch. He’s gotta be cool. So he just shakes his head and laughs at Louis’ antics and starts counting down the hours until lunchtime tomorrow.

The rest of the week passes in pretty much the same way. They have three more sessions together before test day, which almost lets them cover up to where the class is. After the exam, Louis is out the door and gone from sight as soon as the bell rings, leaving Harry to fret.

He gets a text from Louis later, though, just when he was starting to worry that maybe he’d done something wrong to ruin this delicate miracle of a relationship, after all.

 **_(Louis, 7:42 PM)_ ** _Hey mate_

It’s the first non-business text Louis’ ever sent him. _And_ it includes the word mate. Harry takes a deep breath and remembers his game plan about being cool.

 **_(Harry, 7:43 PM)_ ** _Hiiiiiii_

Shit. Okay, maybe the plan needed some work.

 **_(Louis, 7:44 PM)_ ** _Haha, hiiiii to you too. How’d the exam go?_

 **_(Harry, 7:46 PM)_ ** _Fine… you?_

 **_(Louis, 7:47 PM)_ ** _Dunno, haven’t got the scores back have we_

 **_(Harry, 7:49 PM)_ ** _Yeah but how do you THINK you did?_

 **_(Louis, 7:51 PM)_ ** _ummmmmm_

 **_(Harry, 7:51 PM)_ ** _uh oh… that bad_

Minutes passed with no reply, and Harry started chewing his fingernail to distract him from the screen that refused to light up. He was about to run out of nails when a reply did come- just not the kind Harry was expecting. Instead of a cutesy envelope animation with Louis’ name beneath it, there was the picture he’d snapped during their session on Wednesday and the little phone symbol that meant his crush was _actually calling him._

Harry took a deep, fortifying breath. _Please, please don’t be a loser, Harry._

“Uh, hello?”

“Harry, hey. It’s Louis.”

“Erm, yeah, I saw. What’s… what’s up?”

“I don’t think I did very well on that test,” Louis blurted out just above a mumble. “I think I probably failed it, so.”

“You didn’t fail it,” replied Harry more confidently than he felt. “You know almost all of the material, and you’re really smart when you try.”

“But I got _distracted,_ Harry, and then I couldn’t remember anything you taught me. I tried making those tables for like every question, but then I couldn’t remember what formula to use or where to plug it all in. Maybe she’ll give me half credit or something-”

“You’re going to be fine, Louis,” Harry said firmly. “You know more than you think, seriously.”

Louis sighed, long and labored. “I guess… still worried, though.”

“Well, don’t,” Harry replied lamely. _You’re too beautiful to be stressed out._

“We find out Monday, right?”

“Yeah. So- I guess we don’t really need to do lunch on Monday, then, since there’s no new material yet. And now that you’re like, caught up, we might not need to do it every day, I guess.” Harry had been bracing himself for this one. The words felt heavy with disappointment as they left his mouth, but it had to be easier to say a bad thing than to hear it from someone you care so deeply for.

“About that,” Louis began slowly.

Harry’s heart sunk. _So this is it, then,_ he thought glumly. _We’ve had a good run, pretending that prince charming actually enjoyed my presence. Now he’s out of the danger zone with his grades and poof! There I go. At least I’ll have the memories._

Louis continued on, oblivious of the racket in Harry’s brain. “I was thinking- maybe we should do it after school instead of at lunch? Or like, in the evenings? Because I’m always super keyed up at school, you know how I am, so I thought maybe if it was later when I was chilled out or whatever, then I could focus better? I dunno.”

“You just want to change the time,” Harry exhaled, a smile creeping over his face. “That’s all.”

“Er, yeah, if that’s cool with you.”

 _I would meet you at 2:75am on the 32nd day of every month if that’s what you wanted-_ “Yeah, sure, that’s fine. Um, what time, then?”

“Well I have sisters that I help take care of, so could we maybe do it later at night? Like, after they go to bed?”

“Of course, sure. But- how late does the school stay open? We might not be able to stay long-”

“Well I was thinking we’d just do it at my place from now on, actually,” Louis interrupted. “Probably better that way anyways, so we don’t have to do it in the library.”

One corner of Harry’s mouth twitched up in a wry smile. “Yeah, don’t want to ruin your reputation by having everyone see you hang out with a nerd.”

Maybe Louis picked up on the fact that Harry was only half joking, because his voice was mild when he scoffed and corrected the other boy. “Oh, stop. I’m not ashamed to be seen with you, I just don’t want to bug you when you’re in the library. That seems like it’s, I dunno, your happy place or something. Everyone should have a place like that.”

Harry forgets how to reply. Of all of the many things he’s tucked away in his mind about the whirlwind who haunted his daydreams, he never would have guessed him to be so… insightful. He was clever, yes, and kind, but this took a level of attention and thought that Harry didn’t know Louis was capable of lavishing on anything… or anyone.

It was kind of blowing his mind.

“So your place, Monday night? What time?” was all Harry trusted himself to reply.

“Nine?”

“I’ll be there.”

And he would. As long as Louis was letting him, he’d be there. Even if he was just some nerdy tutor.

………………….

“Okay, don’t be weird,” Harry muttered to himself on his way to Louis’ place Monday night.

It was sort of becoming a mantra lately, but it was also sort of working. It was a full week now since he’d had his first conversation with Louis, and so far, he hadn’t done anything horrifyingly embarrassing like stare at his lip piercing or doodle hearts in the margins of his scrap paper. Of course, he was irrationally proud of Louis’ C+ on that exam, and his stomach still got fluttery every time their elbows bumped or whatever, and Louis’ constant antics made him always an inch from giggles, but at least he was able to keep that stuff locked down tight. In front of Louis. Most of the time.

And oddly enough, Harry kind of felt… a little louder? I mean, obviously he was talking more because Louis never wanted to shut up, but it was more than that. Even if no one paid Harry any more attention than usual, he felt like maybe they _could._ He felt a little more connected to the world around him, like maybe he was a functioning part of it instead of just a piece of furniture.

Hmm. Strange.

He still felt a lot like the quiet kid in the back of stats class, though as he approached Louis’ front door. His instincts were telling him to get back in his stepdad’s car and drive home and pretend like he got the flu or something because this was _Louis Tomlinson’s house_ and everything was far too surreal at the moment.

But he didn’t. He texted Louis- _here, didn’t want to ring the doorbell because of your sisters-_ and waited until the door swung wide to reveal Louis, looking as relaxed and comfy as a breath of fresh air, barefoot and hoodie-clad and free of-

“Piercings,” Harry blurted. “Your piercings, they’re- where are they?”

“Hey to you, too,” Louis snorted. “But. They’re fake. Wanna come in, or?”

“What? Oh, um, thanks. Fake?”

“Yeah. I like the look, but my mom won’t actually let me pierce anything until I’m 18,” Louis explained, leading Harry through the house into the kitchen. “You never noticed?”

“Guess I’m not an expert on piercings,” Harry mumbled, fascinated. Those piercings had always seemed so essential to Louis’ image, to his _personality._ Louis Tomlinson was a bad boy, the kind of guy your mom wouldn’t want you to bring home, but if the piercings were fake-

“Don’t be fooled, I’m still a little punk asshole,” Louis smirked like he could read Harry’s mind. “Just one with no real holes in his face. Yet.”

Harry couldn’t help but smile at that. “Noted. Little punk asshole, now and forever.”

“You’re catching on! Now, explain to me what the fuck we were talking about in class because I was playing Flappy Bird the entire time.”

It didn’t even bother Harry that they were back to business, because whenever Louis was busy working at a practice problem, Harry got to just sit there and peek at him out of the corner of his eye for minutes at a time. Sonnets were writing themselves in his head. It was like a  whole new boy who sat here with his unmarked face and his sweater paws, chewing on the string of his hoodie and-

-scrubbing vigorously at his eyes?

“You alright, Louis?” Harry asked with concern. “Do you have something in your eye, or-?”

“Just a little sore. Give me a second, yeah? I’ll be right back.” Louis slid off of his stool and padded out of the kitchen, leaving Harry to sit at the counter awkwardly and wait for him to return. Which he did, a moment later, and Harry couldn’t stop his jaw from dropping.

“What?” Louis sniffed defensively. “They’re just glasses. Contrary to popular belief, I’m not _actually_ a flawless human being.”

“No, I just- I didn’t- I hadn’t noticed you wore contacts,” stuttered Harry. _Jesus, is there anything else I’m stupid enough to have missed?_

“Yeah, well, don’t tell anyone, okay? I have a reputation, wouldn’t want this getting out. Glasses are for nerds, and I’m supposed to be top dog.”

Harry was already on his way to laughing when Louis’ eyes went wide and some of the color drained from his face, cutting off Harry’s giggle. “Shit, that came out wrong,” Louis blurted, wincing. “There’s nothing wrong with wearing glasses, obviously. Like, I don’t think you’re a nerd just because you wear glasses or anything. And even if you _are_ a nerd, it’s not like it’s a bad thing- look, I was trying to be funny, but the thing is, I’m kind of a massive idiot and that actually turned out to be a dick thing to say? And. Yeah.”

“It’s fine,” Harry replied with a blush. “It’s okay, I wasn’t, like, offended or anything.”

“Still a dick thing to say,” Louis sighed. “I have no filter, such a fucking idiot.”

“Don’t worry about it, seriously. Do number 18, no more stalling,” Harry prodded gently. Apparently Louis still felt bad, because he didn’t even try to weasel his way out of it for once. The metallic taste of blood found Harry’s tongue as he chewed on his lip even more vigorously than normal.

“You know, it’s okay if you do that,” he said quietly after a moment. Louis’ head lifted, eyes searching Harry in confusion. “It’s fine if you tease me. I know that I’m a nerd or whatever, and you’re- well, you’re you. So it’s not going to surprise me or anything if you want to say stuff like that. It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not,” Louis returned, no hesitation. “What kind of friend makes fun of you for being smart?”

Which pretty much makes it official: the wonders never cease. First, Louis Tomlinson talked to him. Second, he got to be a part of his life, even in some tiny way. Third, he was here in Louis’ house, seeing new sides of him that Harry was pretty sure not too many people got to see. And just when Harry thought he’d reached the high point of his subdued little existence-

There’s a new melody playing in Harry’s head by the time he leaves to go home that night. He can’t decide whether to call it _Louis’ Symphony No. 5,_ or _Für Louis._ Neither seems quite beautiful enough.

………………….

It’s a funny sort of rhythm they fall into, Harry and Louis. They now officially meet three times a week at Louis house after his sisters are asleep to study for statistics. Unofficially, though, they’re getting a little inseparable. They text all the time, and Louis’ starting to show up at Harry’s house at random hours- not that Harry minds that a single bit. The first time Louis wads up an instructions sheet and beams it at Harry in the middle of statistics, Harry can’t stop grinning for an hour.

And he’s learning how to handle Louis better, too. Like he knows to let Louis keep his hands busy while he studies so he won’t get so restless, or how he figures out that tea always calms him down, or how the best way to distract him if he’s upset is to ask him to tell a story, since that’s usually an exciting half-hour affair for him. He learns that Louis is an unstoppable force that can only be worked _with,_ not against.

The more Harry learns, the harder he falls.

His journal might as well be titled “The Louis Files,” because at this point almost every page is scrawled with something about him. How can Harry _not_ write everything about him? There’s always something new to love about Louis, all the little quirks and intricacies that were coming to light as he softened and and worked his way right into Harry’s life. How could he not write about that?

Louis just plowed along, oblivious. He was humming to himself and doodling on the inside of his forearm with sharpie while Harry was on the other end of the couch trying to figure out how to work ‘resplendent’ into his meter.

“What are you drawing?” Harry asked fondly.

Louis looked up in surprise, tongue still poking out of the corner of his mouth in concentration. “Huh? Oh, it’s supposed to be a tree. Tattoo idea, yeah? With like the roots on the heel of my hand and the branches going up into the crease of my elbow… Kind of hard to get the angle right, though,” he tacked on, twisting his wrist unnaturally to create the curve of the branches.

Harry only hesitated for a tiny second. “Do you- you want some help?”

“Sure,” Louis grinned. “I mean, if you want.”

He scooted down to Harry’s end of the couch, baring his arm and offering up the sharpie. “You trust me to deface your skin with something permanent?” he murmured as he traced graceful arcs up and across the smooth skin.

“Not as permanent as a tattoo would be. Although I’d probably trust you with that, too.”

 _I wouldn’t,_ Harry thought. He could feel Louis’ breath on his ear, gentle and warm. How were his hands not shaking? How was he not trembling to pieces at the way he could feel Louis’ pulse under his fingers?

Maybe it was _because_ he could feel Louis’ pulse. It was like dreaming of something so often that you forget it’s not real, until suddenly it is and you can exhale because reality and expectation are aligning like stars in the cosmos. This heartbeat is the quietest part of Louis. He’s finally done it. He’s finally seen the calm inside the storm.

Funny, how he can still manage to fall harder than before.

“There. That good?” Harry exhaled a little unsteadily, just before he made the mistake of looking up at Louis.

Blue eyes are far too close for safety, but Louis smiles like he doesn’t know how dangerous he is. “Perfect, thanks.”

As soon as Louis’ back on his end of the couch and Harry remembers how gravity works, the journal is out and he’s scribbling lines of nonsense about skin and blood and butterflies. When he peeks over at Louis, the other boy is calmly etching leaves onto the branches like nothing has happened. Harry has to remind himself that probably, nothing did. He makes sure to write that, too.

“Hey Harry?” Louis asks a few minutes later.

“Hmm?”

“What are you always writing about in that journal of yours?”

Harry feels his eyes go wide and his heart starts to work overtime. “N-nothing,” he stammers. “Just, like, poems and stuff.”

Louis’ smile is gentle and oblivious. “Yeah? That’s really cool, can I read some?”

“No!”

It comes out a lot more forcefully than Harry really intends, but Louis just raises his eyebrows. “Sure, yeah. No worries. You don’t have to, I was just curious,” he says lightly.

 _Calm down, Harry, Jesus,_ Harry scolds himself. _Don’t be a freak about it._ “Okay,” he squeaks to Louis, attempting to arrange his face into some casual sort of expression. “Just. They’re kind of personal. And like. Stuff.”

For all of Louis’ many wonderful qualities, he’s sort of a terrible liar, so Harry believes him when he looks at Harry and says, “Of course. I won’t push you on it. I promise.”

………………….

And Louis really, _really_ had meant it.

He was a prankster, sure, and a tease, and probably a little ADHD if he was being honest. But for all his faults, Louis wasn’t actually a bad guy. When he promised Harry that he wouldn’t push about the journal, he meant it, because if it was that important to Harry, it was important to Louis, too.

But unfortunately, ‘not pushing’ didn’t cover Louis finding the journal left under his kitchen table one night after Harry goes home. ‘Pushing’ is far different from peeking.

And Louis _had_ to peek, he just _had_ to, because he’s Louis and this is Harry and there is still enough mystery hiding behind those dark frames and shy smiles to make it impossible not to want to unravel every part of his mind. It isn’t Louis’ fault. It isn’t under Louis’ control.

The page it falls open to contains only a poem in Harry’s familiar, tidy script.

_ Kilometers_

_The largest hurricane ever recorded was 1,520 kilometers across.  
_ _She swept through cities and brought them to their knees,  
_ _Showed them their gods through rainstorm windows  
_ _By the glow of lightning strikes,  
_ _To the chorus of thunderbolts.  
_ _She was 1,520 kilometers across.  
_ _But my hurricane is small, and he is greater than she ever was.  
_ _He is smaller than the distance between my fingertips when I  
_ _Spread my arms wide to beg for him.  
_ _He is slender enough to fit inside the curve of my body when I  
_ _Lay my head down to dream of him.  
_ _He is mortal enough to have substance beneath my hands,  
_ _To have bones and skin and flesh,  
_ _To breathe in and out,  
_ _To leave footprints where he walks, where his slight body meets the earth,  
_ _He is 1,520 kilometers wide.  
_ _He is a sun-kissed hurricane that I never saw coming,  
_ _That I never could,  
_ _That could level my cities and never even try.  
_ _I am brought to my knees by the way  
The air refuses to settle when he leaves a room. By the way_   
_Elements are born in his gaze. By the way_   
_He cannot pass by without touching and moving and shaping and changing every thing,  
_ _Every boy-city,  
_ _In his path.  
_ _He is blue eyes and massive storm, 1,520 kilometers wide._

_I am swept away._

 

Louis doesn’t even have to see the little “to Louis” scrawled in the corner of the page to know. He feels the revelation hit him like a physical thing. The more he flips through the pages, the surer he is, until he’s more certain of this than he has been of anything else up until this moment:

Harry Styles is head-over-heels in love with him.

And the puzzle pieces started falling into place in Louis’ poor, oblivious mind. The blushes, the stammers, the breathless grins. The way he protected that journal like it was a part of him, because in a way, it was.

Laughter bubbled up out of Louis’ chest, a startled burst of wonderment. To think that all this time, after months of tutoring, he was just now finding out that Harry had been gaga for him since the start, or even before- it was just so… _cute._

Which was a pretty good word for Harry, actually. Louis wasn’t really the type to spend a lot of time pondering ideas or thinking about people, but now that he was… well, there were certainly worse people to have liking you than a bright-eyed, sweet-hearted, good-looking guy like Harry. There were certainly worse people to like right back, maybe.

Louis doesn’t stop thinking about it for hours, well after he places the journal back beneath the kitchen chair for Harry to find the next time he visits. The idea is stuck in his head and it won’t come loose. It’s a new sort of sensation for Louis, and he can’t seem to mind it.

………………….

Finals arrive.

Harry’s stressing for two this year, because not only is he worried about _his_ grades, but also Louis’. Which is doubly silly, because he’s going to ace them all as usual and Louis’ grades are dramatically higher than they were when Harry found them. But Louis is hovering right on the cusp of a B+ and if Harry could just get him through one last exam-

“Hey, Harry,” Louis called as he jogged down the hallway towards where Harry was just about to duck into his Spanish class. “Got a sec?”

“Yeah, what’s up?”

“I was thinking, maybe we could add another session this week? For review? I keep forgetting that shit about- sorry, Profesora Garcia- that stuff about sample variance, and I just _know_ that’s going to wind up being half the test, with my luck.”

“Louis Tomlinson wants to study _more?”_ Harry teased quietly. “Am I hallucinating?”

“Oh, don’t be a dick, Harry- I’m _sorry,_ Profesora! So can we?” he tacks on for Harry as he starts to back away, summoned to his own class by the warning bell.

“Of course,” replied Harry. That always seemed to be the answer with Louis.

At least he got a beaming smile in return, so Harry’s heart was properly melted. “You’re the best, H. I want this win really bad- I’ve got people to make proud of me, you know.” Louis gives one last jerk of his chin in farewell and turns on his heel to hurry away.

They wind up studying every night that week. Louis frets about every one of his exams, even if he tries not to show it. The two days between their statistics exam and when they get them back are the worst- Louis is fidgeting and squirming even worse than usual.

Finally the scores get passed back to them, as they leave the classroom. Louis gets there first, and Harry waits impatiently in line for his own- an A, of course- and hopes that Louis won’t try to slip away without telling Harry what he got.

Turns out he’s waiting at Harry’s locker with an absolute poker face on. “How’d it go, Harry?”

“Fine- how’d it go for you?”

“Fine.”

“...Are you going to elaborate any, or?”

“Might.”

“Louis,” huffed Harry. “Come on, the suspense is killing me.”

“What’s the magic word?”

“Please.”

“No, not that one.”

“Abracadabra?”

“Nope.”

“Louis, I swear to god-”

“I got a 94.”

It takes a second for the words to sink in, but when they do, Harry is grinning so hard his face might split in half. “Are you serious? Louis, that’s _fantastic-”_

“It’s all thanks to you, my tutor extraordinaire,” Louis said fondly. His voice is as quiet as it has ever been, and that’s the only warning Harry gets before Louis leans forward, tangles one hand in Harry’s curls, and kisses him.

For once, there are no verses writing themselves in Harry’s brain. He doesn’t have room for that nonsense when he’s busy kissing Louis back with everything he has.

Louis is the first to speak when at last he pulls back. “Might have accidentally peeked in your journal that time you left it at my place. And I might have seen some poems about me and figured out I was more than just a pupil to you.”

“That was… that was months ago,” Harry answers past the reeling sensation. “You’ve known how I felt for _months?_ Oh my _god-”_

“No, it’s cute though!” Louis rushes to reassure him, pressing another, quicker kiss to Harry’s lips. Slack mouth turns responsive in an instant at the touch, and Louis smiles into the kiss. “Seriously. If I didn’t think it was cute, I wouldn’t be standing at your locker making out with you, right?”

“Uh- right? I’m still catching up here, this is sort of a lot to take in…”

“Of course,” Louis nods, face a show of solemnity. “Shall I stop kissing you so you can process?”

“No! I mean… no. Nope, the kissing’s fine. Kissing’s- yes. Please.”

When he’s done laughing, Louis continues his gentle assault on Harry’s lips. He’s been thinking about those kind of a lot recently- more than Louis tends to think about any one thing. It’s sort of nice to stop thinking about them and just feel them on him, though.

“You know, the semester’s over,” Louis finally says. “So you’re not my tutor anymore.”

“This is true.”

“Which means there’s no more conflict of interest. You know, if you wanted to take me out like a proper gentleman.”

He’s batting his eyelashes at Harry in a way that couldn’t be resisted even if he tried. Harry doesn’t try. “And what if you need a tutor again next year? Do I have to stop taking you out, then, to keep it on the up-and-up?”

Louis grins slyly, and it’s probably one of the most beautiful things Harry has yet to write about. “I’m sure we can work something out.”

**Author's Note:**

> If you want to hear me doing a reading of Harry's poem for Louis, Kilometers, you can find it on my tumblr (canonlarry) here!
> 
> http://canonlarry.tumblr.com/post/77359741311/the-largest-hurricane-ever-recorded-was-1-520


End file.
